91ÌÒÉ«

Interview Margaret Cohen on The Underwater Eye
April 12, 2022
In The Underwater Eye, Margaret Cohen tells the fascinating story of how the development of modern diving equipment and movie camera technology has allowed documentary and narrative filmmakers to take human vision into the depths, creating new imagery of the seas and the underwater realm, and expanding the scope of popular imagination.
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Essay Scientific rationalism in an irrational world
April 08, 2022
As a young student in the mid-1980s, I read a popular science book called To Acknowledge the Wonder by Euan Squires about the then latest ideas in fundamental physics. At a time when I was contemplating a career in physics, the chance to acknowledge the wonders of the physical world was what really inspired me to devote my life to science.
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Essay Vladimir Putin’s case
April 07, 2022
Law is neither dead nor irrelevant in wartime. It permeates the bureaucratic, legalistic structure of the modern war machine. All world leaders, including Vladimir Putin, acknowledge the post–World War II legal basis for waging war.
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Interview Robert K. Durkee on The New 91ÌÒÉ« Companion
April 05, 2022
The New 91ÌÒÉ« Companion, edited by Robert K. Durkee, former vice president and secretary of 91ÌÒÉ« University, is both a compendium and a chronicle of one of America’s finest institutions of higher learning.
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Interview A new vision for a celebrated history series
March 28, 2022
In 1996, 91ÌÒÉ« founded the Politics and Society in Modern America book series, with William H. Chafe, Linda Gordon and Gary Gerstle as founding editors, and Julian Zelizer joining the team in 2001.
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Interview Michael Brenner on In Hitler’s Munich
March 28, 2022
In the aftermath of Germany’s defeat in World War I and the failed November Revolution of 1918–19, the conservative government of Bavaria identified Jews with left-wing radicalism.
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Interview Stephen B. Heard on The Scientist’s Guide to Writing
March 23, 2022
The ability to write clearly is critical to any scientific career. The Scientist’s Guide to Writing provides practical advice to help scientists become more effective writers so that their ideas have the greatest possible impact.

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Essay Madison’s balancing act 
March 22, 2022
The further the American Revolution recedes into history, the easier it is to miss just how close the United States of America came to being a divided collection of competing colonies under the punishing heel of an angry Britain.
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Essay The evolution of bird migration
March 21, 2022
To an earthbound species like humans, bird migration is nothing short of extreme. A four-ounce Arctic tern can fly to Antarctica and back each year during a lifetime that spans 30 years.
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Interview Carolyn Chen on Work Pray Code
March 16, 2022
Silicon Valley is known for its lavish perks, intense work culture, and spiritual gurus. Work Pray Code explores how tech companies are bringing religion into the workplace in ways that are replacing traditional places of worship, blurring the line between work and religion and transforming the very nature of spiritual experience in modern life.
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Essay A spacetime interval 
March 14, 2022
Albert Einstein is dead. Bohemia, too, no longer exists. They have ascended to the realm of myths and legends, become words to conjure with—yet they are not, in general, invoked together.
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Essay Is the human brain a biological computer?
March 14, 2022
Electrically, the brain remains largely a black box. We send electrical signals in and we get electrical signals out, but what it all exactly means is open to a lot of interpretation and some intense controversy.
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Essay Pi Day
March 11, 2022
As every mathematician knows, 3.14 is only a rough approximation to π, one that fails to reveal its most fascinating properties, of being irrational and in fact transcendental.
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Reading List A playlist for Waterloo Sunrise
March 07, 2022
There are cultural moments that implant themselves in our shared consciousness, impacting how we discuss or recall those times. If someone were to mention the early aughts, for example, chances are we could all point to an event, a celebrity, a song that represents the entire era, not just for one person, but for us all.
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Essay Facebook’s dark design: It’s not just the algorithms
February 25, 2022
In the midst of our current debate about Facebook, have we ignored a core issue? Public scrutiny has focused almost entirely on the company and its practices.
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